4 ms·

There are a lot of legitimate reasons to cut out the summer vacation or at least move to a year round schedule where the breaks are spread out throughout the ye

by ktsmith 17y ago

There are a lot of legitimate reasons to cut out the summer vacation or at least move to a year round schedule where the breaks are spread out throughout the year. My wife teaches at a school with a large Hispanic population for whom English is a second language. These students will often lose a lot of their progress not only with the typical academics like every student, but their language progression as well. This means that they are further and further behind every year. It's even worse for those students that go visit family in their country of origin over the summer as they speak even less English while gone. While I personally hate standardized testing, this is one of the areas most effected by the language skill loss over the summer. It's difficult to take a test that uses specific academic language when you don't understand what's being asked, even if you understand how to do the work. This is especially true with the math word problems they are presented with. I absolutely agree that going to a six day school week would be terrible. Given that we are moving steadily towards teaching kids how to take tests they need that time away from school to learn and grow in other ways. Of course that requires a lot of parental involvement and/or turning off the tv and video games. Those are separate issues of course.

protomyth 17y ago
I think the added time in school in summer or any year round schedule is counter productive in other ways. Summer jobs (farming in my end of the country), camp, outreach programs by colleges, family vacations, and just being a kid. Setbacks in English are a problem, but having school full time isn't a good solution. Spending the money that would have been spent keeping the school open for all on intensive language programs for those who need it would be a better use of the money. Hire the companies that contract with the military and State Department. Fix the problems of subgroups with solutions for subgroups.
- ktsmith 17y ago
  The problem with summer vacation is that it's between 8 and 10 weeks in most places. During that time the kids lose some of what they learned the previous year and then more time is wasted at the beginning of the next school year on review. Certainly there are other things that are beneficial in other ways and for other reasons that are available in the summer. Let's be honest though, how many kids are actually doing those things compared to the number of kids sitting around watching tv, playing video games etc. Most year round schools in the US simply shift the 8-10 weeks of break into three smaller breaks. This gives the kids and families time to take their vacations, go to camps etc. This is better for the children in many cases as they have less time away from the school in witch to lose those new concepts that they have learned. Additionally many school districts have managed to use year round schedules and track systems to service more children from fewer schools. Finally, if you look at other industrialized nations that are offering significantly better educations and having better results with their education systems you'll find that they don't have these long summer breaks. We are no longer a farming nation as a whole, and the summer vacation being necessary for everyone to work in the fields is an outdated concept for the vast majority of our citizens. I'm not suggesting a reduction in the total time away from school, though there's an argument for that, simply removing the single large block during the summer.
  - prodigal_erik 17y ago
    > During that time the kids lose some of what they learned the previous year Shouldn't we train teachers and devise lessons that actually give lasting knowledge? To me anything less seems like a waste of everyone's time. Shorter breaks only delay the problem, because eventually the kids are going to graduate, which is the longest break of all.
    - ktsmith 17y ago
      Loss is typically attributed to not using their newly learned skills. Teachers are constantly being bombarded with new ways to teach things, and new ways to focus on retention and comprehension. Since this has been a problem for decades it's logical to deduce that the teaching methods aren't the problem and the break is. For adults it might not be that big of a deal to lose the specifics learned in school as hopefully the ability to learn and tools for learning have stuck. When you are trying to immediately build on a specific set of skills it can be a real hindrance to have to reteach things that the student should already know, but has lost because they didn't use it for 10 weeks. This may not even be that big of a problem for older students, but at the grade school level we are wasting the kids time by having to reteach things.
  - protomyth 17y ago
    "We are no longer a farming nation as a whole" - That's fine (although farming is a huge export that is not likely to get outsourced like other industry), but we still have a significant number of states that depend on it. That "outdated concept" is not really so outdated. The smaller breaks are BS. They do not allow for summer sports, actual camps, actual outreach programs by college, or decent paying summer jobs. If you need time for students with special circumstances (english as a second language) then use the summer for them, but not to keep everyone in school. Part of being a kid is learning to think and imagine, and schools are the last place those things are valued. Innovation happens here, and needs to not be stifled by some scheme to keep kids in school all year. I also agree with prodigal_erik, why do they lose these lessons? If the lessons won't survive the summer, then they are surely not going to survive when they leave school. Our schools are not the only place where learning happens. Jobs teach, summer camps teach, and sports teach. They all teach lessons that schools can't or won't.

by ktsmith 17y ago

protomyth 17y ago

I think the added time in school in summer or any year round schedule is counter productive in other ways. Summer jobs (farming in my end of the country), camp, outreach programs by colleges, family vacations, and just being a kid. Setbacks in English are a problem, but having school full time isn't a good solution. Spending the money that would have been spent keeping the school open for all on intensive language programs for those who need it would be a better use of the money. Hire the companies that contract with the military and State Department. Fix the problems of subgroups with solutions for subgroups.

ktsmith 17y ago
The problem with summer vacation is that it's between 8 and 10 weeks in most places. During that time the kids lose some of what they learned the previous year and then more time is wasted at the beginning of the next school year on review. Certainly there are other things that are beneficial in other ways and for other reasons that are available in the summer. Let's be honest though, how many kids are actually doing those things compared to the number of kids sitting around watching tv, playing video games etc. Most year round schools in the US simply shift the 8-10 weeks of break into three smaller breaks. This gives the kids and families time to take their vacations, go to camps etc. This is better for the children in many cases as they have less time away from the school in witch to lose those new concepts that they have learned. Additionally many school districts have managed to use year round schedules and track systems to service more children from fewer schools. Finally, if you look at other industrialized nations that are offering significantly better educations and having better results with their education systems you'll find that they don't have these long summer breaks. We are no longer a farming nation as a whole, and the summer vacation being necessary for everyone to work in the fields is an outdated concept for the vast majority of our citizens. I'm not suggesting a reduction in the total time away from school, though there's an argument for that, simply removing the single large block during the summer.
- prodigal_erik 17y ago
  > During that time the kids lose some of what they learned the previous year Shouldn't we train teachers and devise lessons that actually give lasting knowledge? To me anything less seems like a waste of everyone's time. Shorter breaks only delay the problem, because eventually the kids are going to graduate, which is the longest break of all.
  - ktsmith 17y ago
    Loss is typically attributed to not using their newly learned skills. Teachers are constantly being bombarded with new ways to teach things, and new ways to focus on retention and comprehension. Since this has been a problem for decades it's logical to deduce that the teaching methods aren't the problem and the break is. For adults it might not be that big of a deal to lose the specifics learned in school as hopefully the ability to learn and tools for learning have stuck. When you are trying to immediately build on a specific set of skills it can be a real hindrance to have to reteach things that the student should already know, but has lost because they didn't use it for 10 weeks. This may not even be that big of a problem for older students, but at the grade school level we are wasting the kids time by having to reteach things.
- protomyth 17y ago
  "We are no longer a farming nation as a whole" - That's fine (although farming is a huge export that is not likely to get outsourced like other industry), but we still have a significant number of states that depend on it. That "outdated concept" is not really so outdated. The smaller breaks are BS. They do not allow for summer sports, actual camps, actual outreach programs by college, or decent paying summer jobs. If you need time for students with special circumstances (english as a second language) then use the summer for them, but not to keep everyone in school. Part of being a kid is learning to think and imagine, and schools are the last place those things are valued. Innovation happens here, and needs to not be stifled by some scheme to keep kids in school all year. I also agree with prodigal_erik, why do they lose these lessons? If the lessons won't survive the summer, then they are surely not going to survive when they leave school. Our schools are not the only place where learning happens. Jobs teach, summer camps teach, and sports teach. They all teach lessons that schools can't or won't.